


Green and Pleasant Land

by talboys



Category: Sherlock (TV), The Odyssey - Homer
Genre: Greek Gods in the present day, Sherlock AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-08
Updated: 2014-11-06
Packaged: 2018-02-03 22:15:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1758321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/talboys/pseuds/talboys
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sing to me of the man, Muse, the clever man who traveled far and wide after Jim Moriarty’s ignoble end.  Tell us of the places he saw, the pains he suffered, and the cases he solved for Queen and county in order to come home to Baker Street once more. Tell us of John, left alone to grieve, of Molly, his clever accomplice, and of Anderson, a man inspired by the gods. Oh, Muse, sing!</p><p>A Sherlock/Odyssey fusion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Book 1: Athena Inspires Anderson

**Author's Note:**

> With many thanks (and apologies) to Robert Fagles' brilliant translation of The Odyssey.
> 
> The title is borrowed from the final stanza of Blake's poem, which serve as the lyrics to Jerusalem (just to muddle mythologies and literature a bit more). To save you from needing to look it up:
> 
> I will not cease from mental fight,  
> Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,  
> Til we have built Jerusalem  
> In England's green and pleasant land.

Lives had been reordered since the Fall. Months had passed, jewel heists had stopped and the names Holmes and Moriarty were no longer eagerly passed along from gossiping mouth to greedy ear. The gods had restored the world to a semblance of order and it seemed only right that Sherlock Holmes should fit back into his natural position – but it was not to be so. Poseidon, keeper of the seas isolating the island country from the rest of the world, raged on, determined that Sherlock Holmes should not reach his home at Baker Street.  

The other gods gathered in Zeus’ hall on Olympus to discuss the matter, for they were more sympathetic to Sherlock’s plight.

“I was thinking today,” announced Zeus to the full hall while stroking his long silver beard, “of a man named Nigel Slate.”

“Do you really think this matters?” Hera whispered to Demeter, who shrugged.

“Is anyone familiar with him? Yes, Apollo? Good, good. Now, for the rest of you, Nigel Slate was foolish to fall in love with the wife of another-“

Hera snorted rudely and Zeus ignored her.

“-and generally made a disgraceful mess of himself before murdering both the wife and her husband in a fit of jealous rage.”

Aphrodite sighed dramatically and opened her mouth to pronounce something about the vicious nature of love, but was cut off by the strident and interrupting tones of Athena. “Is there more to this story?” Athena demanded. “Because, as I recall, this meeting was convened to discuss other matters.”

“No,” Zeus admitted after a moment. “It was merely an illustration of the kind of man I would never help and may indeed send down to Hades to be taken care of.”

“And, yet,” Athena said. “In complete contrast to Mr. Whoever-that-was, we have Sherlock Holmes: a man you are _very_ fond of and yet _refuse_ to help.”

When Zeus did not respond, Athena continued angrily: “He is trapped in Tibet, isolated in a monastery where false muses try to erase his mind of memories of Baker Street and prevent him from using his considerable talents. He wants nothing more than to finish this journey home - to John Watson and his life - and yet you refuse to help him. What, my father, could you possibly dislike about Sherlock Holmes?”

“My dear,” Zeus said kindly. “You are speaking complete nonsense – a rarity for yourself, I’m sure you’ll admit. I am extremely fond of Sherlock Holmes – how could I not be? He is clever, he honors the gods, and uses his considerable abilities to solve the problems of others without ever forgetting that we have supported and nurtured his talents over the years. He does not try to steal women from me or other men. It is a great shame, thus, that he has angered Poseidon so grievously by killing one of his sons while on his quest to dismantle Moriarty’s network.”

“Had Poseidon ever met this son?” Athena demanded.

“On occasion. They were not close, but it is the principle of the thing,” Zeus added. “Son-killing is not looked upon favorably, no matter how horrid the son may be. In that respect, though, Sherlock Holmes is very fortunate.”

“Fortunate?” Athena asked skeptically, looking to Hera as though she might be able to translate the nonsense that Zeus was uttering.

“Well, Poseidon didn’t really like him – he was a foul little brute anyway – so he shouldn’t be mad for long!”

Zeus nodded and looked quite pleased with his reasoning. Hera rolled her eyes.

“Am I to understand,” Athena said slowly. “That you will not intervene and are simply allowing to Poseidon to have his fun with revenge? You are keeping a man – a man who you have favored – away from his life, his work and his partner all because you don’t want to get in the way?”

“Yes,” Zeus agreed. “It is not my place to intervene in Poseidon’s wrath when it does not have murderous intent. Just like it is not my place to rid the world of Moriarty’s network for him – haven’t we all learned not to meddle too much with the affairs of mortals? But I think Sherlock may be in a bit of luck – Poseidon certainly seems to be calming down a bit. Wouldn’t you agree?” He addressed the question to the rest of the hall.

The other gods consulted briefly and silently before all nodding in agreement.

Taking this as a sign to continue, Zeus did so. “So, it shouldn’t be too long before Sherlock should be able to start properly making his way back home again,” Zeus concluded cheerfully. “It’s been a year now; I’m sure Poseidon will only keep this up for another year or so. And, in the meantime, we can watch and oversee – but there will be absolutely _no_ interventions. This is what I have brought you all together to hear: does everyone in this hall understand me?”

Athena shook her head in controlled fury. “I’m going to tell them, then,” she declared.

“Tell who, what?” Hera interrupted quickly.

“If no one is allowed to fix this or stop Poseidon from his sadistic tricks, I am going to tell London that this exile is nearly over; that Sherlock Holmes will once again walk the streets he knows so well. I am going to rouse the people of London to provide him a hero’s welcome home and sweep away the lies and deceit spread by Jim Moriarty.” 

“I’m not sure-“ Zeus began.

“I _will_. I am not intervening and you cannot stop me. Consider this meeting adjourned.” And with this pronunciation, Athena left the assembly of the gods and prepared to leave Mt. Olympus for a visit to the mortal world.

“Well!” said Hera after a moment of stunned silence. “That went _remarkably_ well. _Such_ authority you have over your children.”

“Oh, be quiet,” Zeus said sulkily and threw an unwarranted thunderbolt towards Malaysia in annoyance.

\--

Athena descended into London, assuming the guise of a police officer. The scent of humanity filled her nostrils as the grey city-scape spread before her. It was a busy street and no one looked twice at the average-sized, average-looking police officer – everyone was too wrapped up in their own lives. Humans noticed so very little; Sherlock’s ability to see her for who and what she was was one of the reasons why she was so fond of him. She didn’t venture down into the world of men very often and it was a rather heady rush to be hidden amongst the people she had spent so long watching.

And then the sweet, sharp tang of blood wafted by on a breeze, briefly overtaking the smell of damp and hurrying humans: a crime scene. Someone there would be receptive of the news of Sherlock’s return.

Sure enough, down at the end of a dirty alley, was a forensics team examining a prone corpse. Athena assumed a position as an officer guarding the perimeter and waited for someone to notice her.

It didn’t take long. One of the forensic technicians – a tall, reedy man with glasses and a flop of brown hair – wandered near her for a smoke. Athena watched him closely and he shifted, uncomfortable with the attention.

“Safely outside the perimeter, yeah?” He asked a bit awkwardly, pointing at the ground with his cigarette.

Athena nodded.

“Great.” The technician relaxed fractionally and wordlessly held out his pack of cigarettes, offering her one. Athena accepted, pleased with his generosity: this would be a man open to hearing the news.

They smoked in silence, listening to the rowdy black humor from the other technicians that accompanies a bloody and gruesome scene.

“You smoke alone?” Athena asked.

“Well, ahh…no. Yes. I mean, I don’t like to.” The man tripped over his words. “I quit ages ago but it’s been a rough few months and, you know…” He shrugged eloquently. “They’re trying to get me to quit again by social shaming. You know, if it’s no fun, then maybe I’ll stop. Bloody stupid.”

He took a long drag from his cigarette and sighed as he exhaled.

“Uncaring,” Athena said, watching the other technicians.

“I suppose,” he replied, uncertainly.

“Tell me,” she said, turning to face him. “Did you ever know Sherlock Holmes?”

The technician blushed, color rising up his cheeks and staining them red.

“Why?” He demanded defensively.

“You did,” Athena pronounced, enjoying the fact that very few humans could lie convincingly.

“We worked together on several occasions,” the man said stiffly. “I’d prefer not to talk about that right now.”

“What if I told you that he’s coming back?” She asked serenely.

The technician blinked and frowned in incomprehension. “Sorry? He’s dead, you know. Jumped off the roof of Bart’s. Surely you saw the news.”

Athena smiled. “May I give you some advice?”

“Okay,” the technician said warily.

“Start looking. Sherlock is alive – he’s out there and trying to come home to England and to Baker Street. Listen to rumors, check the facts. If you look closely, you’ll see it: the unmistakable progress of Sherlock Holmes journeying home.”

The technician stared at her in shock, his cigarette burning forgotten down to nearly singe his fingers.

“Think back. I know you want to believe in him. I can see you now, trying to work out how it might be true. Think about it – start looking.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” the technician protested weakly, his face betraying the fact that he knew exactly what Athena had meant.

“Oi, Anderson!” a detective from the crime scene shouted, interrupting their conversation. “Are you bloody done, yet? We haven’t got all day!”

“I have to go – it’s the end of my shift. Start looking, Anderson.” Athena walked away, leaving Anderson staring in utter confusion in her wake.

He ground the end of his cigarette under his heel and made his way slowly back over to where Lestrade and the other technicians were standing, well upwind of the decomposing body.

“Got another girlfriend, then?” One of the technicians teased rudely.

“Fuck off. What’s her name? I didn’t ask.”

The technicians and Lestrade all looked at each other, shook their heads and shrugged their shoulders.

“Lestrade, she’s not one of yours?”

“Nah, never seen her before,” He responded easily. “She’s probably part of the local precinct.”

“She said some…odd things.”

“What, about the body?” Lestrade looked suddenly interested, clearing hoping for a break in the case.

“No,” Anderson responded, feeling as though he might be going mad. “About _Sherlock_.”

The other technicians shuffled uncomfortably and began to withdraw to get slowly back to work and away from the conversation. Sherlock was still a touchy subject to bring up with Lestrade: the formal inquiry had allowed him to keep his job, but only just.

“Was she winding you up?” Lestrade demanded. “Did she recognize you or me and decide to have a go? I’ll report her for that – everyone knows that we’ve been cleared of responsibility for having him work on those cases.”

“No,” Anderson said vaguely, trying to remember her exact words. “She said he was alive and that if I looked hard enough I’d see the signs of him trying to get back home.”

Lestrade bit his lip and rather awkwardly put his hand on Anderson’s shoulder. “Look, mate, she was winding you up,” he said kindly. “He’s definitely dead. Molly laid him out – I saw the body and so did you.”

“Did we do a DNA test?” Anderson asked suddenly.

“Of what?”

“Sherlock’s body. Did Molly do a DNA test to confirm it was him?”

“For God’s sake!” Lestrade laughed humorlessly. “It was him. John _watched_ him do it. Why would we do a test?”

“Do you think John would let me talk to him about it?”

Lestrade turned very serious. “That’s a really bad idea – you know how hard this has been for him. He’s trying to get over this. He doesn’t need someone else poking their nose in. All of us should move on. Besides,” he said, nodding towards where the other technicians were carefully examining the ground, “Can we get back to work now? This isn’t going to solve itself.”

“Yeah, sure,” Anderson said distractedly.

He stepped over to the van to get a fresh pair of gloves and as he snapped them on the mysterious police woman’s words floated back into his mind:

 _Start looking, Anderson_.

 Maybe she was right – maybe he should start looking. What harm could looking do?


	2. Book Two: Anderson Starts Researching

That night, after his wife had gone to bed, Anderson sat at his kitchen table and stared at his open laptop. His fingers paused after they opened a fresh search query. Where should he start? _How_ should he start?

The one thing Sherlock Holmes had always been good at was finding the clues that everyone else had missed in order to solve a case. Although he and Sally had found excellent evidence that Sherlock had planted some of the clues in his final cases for the Yard, what about those earlier cases in which he’d been called to consult? To ease his conscience, Anderson had looked closely at every single case that Sherlock had ever been even peripherally involved in. It had been vindicating to see that in nearly every one Sherlock had been left alone with crucial evidence at some point in the proceedings, allowing the possibility that he had somehow fabricated or planted false clues some purchase.

However, there were some in which Sherlock never would have had a chance.  It nagged Anderson like a persistent itch just out of reach. There was no doubt that Sherlock was outrageously clever and there were some cases – like that asphyxiation down in Croydon - where he had absolutely found something everyone had missed without ever having had a chance to plant it. But that didn’t really matter – so long as there was a chance that he’d planted evidence in just _one_ case, he and Sally weren’t wrong to have brought it to the attention of their superiors.

But it bothered him that Sherlock had never actually been caught in the act. And he really _had_ solved some crimes that, without him, would probably be gathering dust with the cold case team. Should he start looking for miraculously solved crimes in the last few months all over the world? An excellent idea; he could trace movements based on the dates of the solved crimes.

His fingers hesitated again – _where_ should he look?

The only thing he could assume was that Sherlock wasn’t in London – _someone_ would have seen him. But that left the rest of the world.

“Oh, God help me,” he muttered.

Athena, observing Anderson from Mt. Olympus, smirked. She could intervene without consequence when intervention was specifically requested. Anderson, of course, hadn’t specified _which_ god he wanted help from, but as he hadn’t specified which gods he _didn’t_ want help from either, he was fair game for any god looking to play with human affairs.

Athena sent down the voice she had adopted as the police woman to point Anderson in the right direction:

_Start in India._

Anderson blinked, startled. Where had _that_ thought come from? India? Why India?

Well, he reasoned, why not India? With no other leads, a sudden thought was just as good as a dart thrown at a map.

At last, his fingers typed with confidence.

The wormhole of the internet sucked Anderson in: was this case bizarre enough? Would the local police force have been able to figure out who the murderer was in that case? Was this case solved by a particularly clever solution or was the answer simply tripped over? Were there any mysterious English men running a detective agency anywhere in India?

So deep was the wormhole, Anderson missed the sunrise and jerked in shock when his wife walked into the kitchen in her dressing gown.

“Did you not sleep at all last night?” she sighed, clearly resigned to have found him at the kitchen table with his computer.

No point in trying to lie about it. Anderson smiled sheepishly as an answer.

“What were you doing, anyway?” His wife walked over to see his laptop screen. Anderson couldn’t really blame her suspicion – they had only just worked through his affair with Sally Donovan before the weird case with Sherlock and all of the investigations and hearings that followed began. Online porn and explicit emails were probably flashing through her mind.

“Crime in India?” she asked uncertainly, glancing through all of his open tabs.

 Anderson decided it would probably be easier to stick to their new Honesty in Our Relationship policy than to invent some half-baked story about a body with ties to India.

“I was researching whether or not Sherlock Holmes might be in India,” he said, shutting the laptop with a firm _click_.

“He’s buried here in England and you know it,” his wife said, deeply confused by his explanation.

“I…well, I was just thinking that maybe he isn’t dead and that he’s alive and well. Maybe in India.”

His wife looked at him with a curious mix of pity, concern, and incredulity. “You know,” she said hesitantly. “Have you thought about going back to that therapist? She was really helpful last time when you felt guilty about his death.”

“This isn’t guilt!” Anderson protested. “This is a legitimate working theory. If he could have fooled us for so long, then he clearly could have faked his death. Which _maybe_ means that he wasn’t fooling us and staging evidence to discover. What’s that…a triple bluff?”

His wife simply stared.

Anderson sighed. “Look, Sarah, I’m fine. Really, I am. I just had a thought and it’s going to bother me until I get a definitive answer.”

“A definitive answer? You were at his funeral!”

“And it wasn’t open-casket, was it? How do we know there was even a body in it?” Anderson challenged.

“Well,” his wife said, with the air of humoring a small child. “Why don’t you put this to rest for once and for all and talk to the tech who prepped his body. Wasn’t it Molly Hooper? She’ll settle this for you. I’m going to go have a shower. Maybe _you_ should think about getting ready for work.”

She left the kitchen and Anderson heard the bathroom door snap shut and the rush of the shower starting. The reality of not having slept suddenly crashed over Anderson’s head like a leaden weight. Today was going to be agonizing.

“Oh God,” he muttered as he went to make himself a large quantity of coffee.

Athena shook her head despairingly. Humans could be so slow on the uptake even when they were shown the easiest path to the answer. But at least this one was trying. If he wasn’t going to figure out the India clue, she could at least point him in a different direction to the same end.

 _Go and see Molly_ , she whispered into Anderson’s ear.

Anderson pulled his mobile from his pocket; it desperately needed to be charged. He walked over to his desk to find the cable. Then a thought struck him: why _not_ ask Molly about the body?

Did he have her mobile number? He scrolled through his contacts and was pleased to see that he did.

_Can we meet this afternoon? I have some questions about a case._

He hoped it wasn’t too early to text. But, he reasoned, she was probably getting ready to start her day just like him.

Anderson wandered back over to fetch the coffee that had finished brewing. As he added sugar he heard his mobile vibrate against the desk. Abandoning the coffee, he grabbed it:  a response from Molly.

_Sure! 3 o’clock at the lab?_

Anderson grinned.

 _See you there,_ he texted back.

Answers were just around the corner now.

 

 


	3. Book Three: Molly Remembers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the delay in posting: I got sick on top of a particularly busy few weeks and time simply got away from me.

Anderson was annoyed by the fact that it was an absurdly sunny day as he approached Bart’s. Then again, he was twitchy from over-caffeinating and irritable from not sleeping – no matter what the weather was, he would probably find it offensive somehow.

 _Don’t make Molly upset. Let her tell you the truth_ , Athena whispered in his ear for encouragement.

“Shut up,” Anderson muttered to himself, waving his hand near his ear irritably as though swatting at a fly.

Athena should have been offended by his disrespect, but instead she was gently amused. Humans unaccustomed to communicating with gods had hilariously misguided assumptions about where those sudden thoughts sprung from. It was most common for humans, like Anderson, to simply believe that their brain was offering them thoughts from a previously untapped and supremely wise source. If one was feeling particularly vindictive in meting out punishment, playing on this assumption was a fun way to drive someone mad.

Anderson found Molly bent over a laptop in her small, cluttered office near the lab. He knocked on the open door and she jumped, startled.

“Oh, hi! I’m so sorry – I got wrapped up in what I was working on and completely lost track of time. What can I help you with?” She smiled helpfully up at him from behind her computer.

“Erm, can I…can I sit?” Anderson asked, pointing at the second chair in Molly’s office, which was shoved into the corner.

“Yeah, sure, just put the files on the floor. That’s fine.”

Anderson carefully put the thick stack of what seemed to be autopsy reports on the floor, pulled the chair around to face Molly, and sat down gingerly.

“I have,” he began, “a question about a body.”

“Okay,” Molly agreed cheerfully.

Anderson thought for a moment, trying to figure out if he could continue asking questions without specifically mentioning Sherlock.

“What would you say is the maximum height someone could fall from and survive their injuries?”

Molly frowned slightly. “Well, hypothetically speaking, that’s really hard to say. It all depends how you land and what you land on. I mean, subdural hematomas are always possible if you hit your head and bounce the brain around a bit. Even a meter could be fatal depending on how you land. You’d really have to give me the specifics of the case if you want any sort of helpful answer.”

“Well, it’s a case of a…a jumper. Several floors up – maybe a hundred feet?”

Molly’s eyes narrowed suspiciously and she shook her head. “You’d need a miracle to walk away from that.”

“How likely,” Anderson asked, leaning forward, “do you think a miracle would be?”

 _Careful_ , Athena whispered.

“Are you asking me about Sherlock? After everything you did, you want to know if he could have faked his death?” Molly asked sharply, her anger slightly spoiled by the tears that had sprung to her eyes.

“It was a thought,” Anderson sighed, leaning back again, hoping that Molly would neither burst into tears nor throw him out of her office.

“Nice thought,” Molly said, uncharacteristically bitter.

Anderson decided that it might smooth things over if Molly heard the real reason for his visit. “Look,” he explained. “I have this theory that Sherlock faked his death and is out there somewhere, maybe trying to come back. I know you did the post-mortem and I was just wondering if you did a DNA test to confirm that the body was really his.”

“Are you accusing me of _falsifying_ records?”

Memories of the investigation into Lestrade’s professional ethics were clearly running through her head, Anderson realized. This was going really poorly.

“No, I’m really not,” Anderson hurried to explain. “I’m trying to see if Sherlock maybe outwitted us all and-“

“So, now you’re accusing me of not being good at my job,” Molly countered.

“No! Just…did you do a DNA test?”

Molly paused and seemed to take pity on him. She picked up a pen from her desk and fiddled with it for a few moments before answering quietly, “I didn’t have to.”

“What do you mean?” Anderson asked quickly.

“I mean, he went up to the roof from my lab. I didn’t stop him because I didn’t know what he was going to do.”

“God…” Anderson said in sympathy.

“Yeah,” Molly agreed.

“So, he didn’t leave a note anywhere in your lab or anything? Nothing weirdly coded into the chemicals?”

“No, he…he called John from the roof. Didn’t you know?”

Anderson’s mouth fell open in shock. “No! I must have missed that what with all of the…mess at the Met.” No need to elaborate that the mess was largely instigated by him and Sally, not when Molly was giving him new information.

“I don’t know what he said, but how _awful_ ,” Molly said, looking grieved over the amount of pain that the call must have caused John.

“Mmm,” Anderson agreed, his mind racing with possibilities of what the call could have contained. Maybe John was in on it. Maybe the call from the roof was to finalize their plans.

The two sat in silence for a moment, Anderson feeling more excited about the new avenues of possibility and Molly looking more pained at the thought of Sherlock’s suicide call.

“Was that all you wanted?” Molly finally asked.

“Um…” Anderson said, thinking quickly. “I never read your report. What was the cause of death, again?”

Molly gave him an odd look. “You’re working on a theory in which he faked his death and you don’t actually know what he died of?”

“It’s a…recent theory,” Anderson said defensively.

“Well, massive internal injuries, basically. Exactly what you’d expect from a fall of that height. Broken ribs punctured some internal organs, lots of internal bleeding, shock, and then death. Pretty straightforward.”

“Great. Thank you.” Anderson stood to leave, but Molly’s voice stopped him at the door.

“Where did your theory come from?” she asked curiously.

“It just struck me the other day.” Anderson said vaguely, not wanting to reveal the mad story of the mysterious police officer’s words.

“Just struck you,” Molly repeated.

Anderson nodded, hoping that she’d drop the subject and let him leave.

“Sounds like the gods are on your side for some reason.”

“What?” Anderson asked, taken aback.

“A sudden theory from ‘nowhere’ that’s entirely contrary to everything you’ve spent the last year fighting for? Come on, Anderson.”

“Do you actually believe in all that?” Anderson asked.

“Yeah,” Molly said with conviction. “How else would you explain all of the strange things that happen? And, from the sounds of it, one of them is definitely getting in touch with you.”

She laughed, noticing the look of horror on Anderson’s face. “But don’t worry. Either they’re completely fucking with you for revenge or they’re pointing you towards the truth. Should be fun either way. See you around!”

Molly, looking suddenly cheerful again, returned to her work, leaving Anderson no option but to leave.

Athena grinned as Anderson stood in the hall, trying to come to terms with the thought that gods might be trying to get in touch with him. Athena had always liked Molly; she didn’t have a particularly innovative mind, but she was clever and humble and had been receptive to colluding with Sherlock on the plan that Athena herself had suggested. Although it would have made this situation with Anderson much easier of Molly had come out and simply said that Sherlock had faked his death in a plot designed in collaboration with a god, Athena had to admire how well Molly was playing her role even now, six months past when Sherlock was supposed to have made his return. Athena wished that she could have simply told Molly to spread the word that Sherlock would be returning soon and that there had been complications from Poseidon, but Zeus would undoubtedly consider that interfering. Besides, all of the old major players needed to remain in place in order for the return to be effective. Anderson had been previously involved, but from the other side: he could be moved.

Anderson was still standing in the hall, looking deeply troubled.

“Hello?” he asked the empty hall, looking up at the ceiling, clearing hoping to see a god manifest itself. “Can, um, any of you hear me?”

When no one replied, he shook his head to clear it. The lack of sleep was clearly getting to him.

He pulled out his mobile and called in sick for the rest of the day before heading home to go to bed. As he finally dropped off to sleep, the thought of John and Sherlock working together to stage Sherlock’s death kept drifting through his mind. He needed to talk to John about that call.


	4. Book Four: John Watson

Anderson spent the rest of the week thinking about how best to talk to John Watson about the delicate subject of Sherlock’s final call. His conversation with Molly – which really had not been as successful as it could have been – he considered to be a practice run. The major flaw, of course, had been that he’d tried to talk around the subject of Sherlock and had only succeeded in making her upset. With John, he should skip straight to the matter at hand and not beat around the brush with stories about hypothetical suicide notes.

In this reasoning, though, Anderson was stuck. He spent several nights lying awake in bed (he could hide the sleeplessness from his deep-sleeping wife better that way) trying to dream up a way to ask John about the sensitive call without being punched in the face. Thinking back to what Molly had said in her office, Anderson hesitantly prayed to the gods as a collective whole for guidance. He’d never prayed to them before and did so furtively and with a great deal of skepticism in the middle of his second night of insomnia.

No guiding voice came to his aid, though, which made him think that either Molly was completely wrong or that, perhaps, his prayer had gotten lost in some sort of celestial switchboard, uncertain of which god it should be forwarded to. Maybe he should try to figure out which god had been in touch with him before. His brain, happy to abandon the problem of how to talk to John, chewed over that conundrum for a few dark hours before Anderson was forced to admit to his pillow that he had even less of an idea about how to identify a god than how to have a difficult conversation with a grieving man.

Athena had, in fact, heard Anderson’s hesitant whispers. Unfortunately, as Anderson was unaware of Zeus’ command to not interfere with Sherlock’s return, he had no way of knowing that no god would respond to his plea. Athena, already flirting with the boundary of what Zeus might consider outright intervention, judged that providing Anderson with a plan to speak with John Watson would be going too far. He was going to have to figure it out on his own.

On the fourth day of insomnia, Anderson’s wife finally noticed that he was drinking far more coffee in the mornings than was his habit and that his breakfast was otherwise largely untouched.

“Are you feeling okay?” She asked worriedly as Anderson blinked owlishly at the large mug of coffee in front of him on the kitchen table.

“Yeah, fine,” he muttered, massaging his closed eyes with the heels of his hands. “I just haven’t been sleeping too well.”

“Mmmm,” his wife hummed sympathetically. “Bad case?”

“Kind of,” Anderson answered as truthfully as he dared.

“Maybe you should see the doctor,” she suggested. “Get some sleeping pills or something. This can’t be good for you.”

“I don’t think I need -“ Anderson automatically protested. A plan suddenly dropped into his head, fully formed and brilliant. Maybe a god really was working with him.

“Actually,” Anderson said, smiling at his wife, “that’s a great idea. I think I’ll go and see a doctor.”

She looked immensely relieved and leaned over to kiss his cheek affectionately. “Good,” she smiled.  

\--

Anderson was led into an exam room with curiously dark walls at the surgery by a petite blonde nurse.

“Dr. Watson will be right with you,” she said with a kind smile after gathering various vital statistics and noting them on the chart.

“Great, thanks.” Anderson watched her leave and sat back on the exam table, feeling anxious and slightly nauseous. He supposed that the dark blue walls in the exam room were painted with the intention of calming nervous patients. They weren’t helping with his anxiety, though; he wondered desperately if he was slightly color-blind. The nurse – Mary, he thought her name badge had said – had probably noticed that his blood pressure was far too high.

Anderson’s thoughts drifted away from his health and onto to his plan to see John. Perhaps this plan to get into the surgery wasn’t actually as brilliant as he’d first thought. He was inside and John was about to walk into the room, sure, but there was no guarantee that he wasn’t going to get punched in the face.

There was a business-like double knock on the door and Anderson’s mind went suddenly and completely blank.

“Mr. Phillips?” he heard John’s voice say kindly as he opened the door. “I’m Dr Watson-“ John’s voice abruptly stopped as he  did a double take between Anderson and the name on the chart in his hand.

John looked terrible, Anderson thought with a stab of guilt. He’d lost a lot of weight in the last year, making his face looked oddly sharp and his clothing too loose. His eyes were strangely dull, as though there were a layer of cling film over the irises. Everything about him seemed creased and worn, as though his entire being was a load of whites that had been washed with dark colors that had bled and stained them all a listless and permanent grey.

At the moment, though, John’s face was an entirely terrible sight to behold and Anderson’s nausea – never a problem at bloody crime scenes - increased by a tenfold. John’s face had shifted minutely upon seeing Anderson from polite competence, to shock, and had settled into a mixture of apprehension and anger. Anderson felt his spine instinctively curve forwards in an attempt to shield his vulnerable torso from the rage silently emanating at him in rapidly breaking waves.

John’s posture, on the other hand, improved remarkably: his spine straightened, his shoulders squared, his entire being sprayed with starch somehow and Anderson belatedly remembered that John had seen combat with the army. This was a mistake; this was worse than talking to Molly.

After what seemed to Anderson like a million heart beats, John nodded with a tightly clenched jaw and looked down at the chart in his hands again.

“Phillips. Andrew Phillips?” John asked softly, his voice filled with a quiet and lethal rage.

Anderson tried to look as penitent as he was physically capable of in reply.

“What do _you_ want?”

Anderson swallowed, trying to coax his voice to work. “I wanted to talk to you about Sherlock,” he finally managed.

John sneered in disgust. “Surely _you_ can find everything in the official records,” he nearly snarled. The hand not holding the chart for Andrew Phillips was clenching repeatedly.

Anderson winced – John must have heard from Lestrade about how he and Sally had instigated the official investigation into Sherlock’s activities. Would everyone always associate him with that?

“It’s not…” Anderson hurried to say. “It’s not about that. I…I think he’s alive.”

John’s eyebrows shot up and his lips seemed to spasm as they tried to form the appropriate words in response.

“Are you just _trying_ to fuck with me?” John finally demanded furiously, a frightening and incongruous smile spreading across his face as he laughed in rage. His eyes were sharper now and they never left Anderson.

“No, no, really, I just need to ask you a question-“ Anderson gasped in fear as John suddenly threw the chart and clipboard in his hand to the floor with a violent crash.

“You sneak in here,” John hissed, “after an entire year, with a false name, just to give me another ridiculous and stupid theory. Oh Lestrade,” He mimed, his voice comically high, “I think Sherlock’s a fake. I think Sherlock’s a kidnapper.” His voice returned to a lower and more dangerous pitch.  “How _dare_ you.”

There was a quiet, hesitant knock on the door and Anderson thought that his heart might explode from the shock of the interruption. John gave him a warning glare and then turned to open the door a fraction of an inch.

It was the pretty nurse from earlier. “Is everything okay?” she asked. “I heard a crash…”

“It’s alright,” John said, his voice calm and very nearly normal. “I just dropped the clipboard. Absolutely nothing to worry about.”

“Oh,” the nurse said, sounding not entirely convinced. “Alright. Let me know if you need anything.”

“Of course,” John said pleasantly, shutting the door again.

“I should report you for harassment,” John said, sitting down in his chair and picking the clipboard up from the floor. “Now, did you actually have a medical problem or was that made up just like your name?”

“Insomnia,” Anderson offered weakly.

John glared eloquently, silently conveying the message that Anderson had never really known what it meant to go for days without sleeping.

“Well,” John said briskly, obviously still furious, “I’m sure that if you can cut down on your caffeine intake, your sleeping will eventually return to normal. And then, if it doesn’t, consult a psychiatrist to work through whatever it is that is keeping you up at night. Have a _nice_ day, Mr. Phillips.” John stood up from his chair and made to leave the exam room.

“I’m really sorry,” Anderson called out unthinkingly to John’s back. “I had no idea what he would do. I was just doing my job.” John’s back was still towards him and he raised one fist to rest it on the door jamb above his head.

“Really. You have to believe me! I was just doing my job.”

John’s back seemed to tighten and Anderson heard him sigh deeply.

“What did you want to ask me?” John said quietly, his back still to Anderson.

“I wanted to know if you thought Sherlock was still alive.”

John turned back around to face him, shaking his head in disbelief.  

“Are you _kidding_ me?”

“No,” Anderson said, breathless from anxiety.

John was struggling to come up with an appropriate response. “We buried him,” he finally managed. “I watched…” John swallowed hard, “I saw it happen.”

A part of Anderson wanted to reach out and comfort John somehow – his eyes, no longer dulled or sharp with sudden fury, instead seemed to be alive with a year’s worth of naked grief.

“You don’t think there’s a chance he might have…faked it?” Anderson felt his voice involuntarily go up an octave on the last two words of his question.

John crossed his arms protectively across his body. “Not possible. We were…talking.”

Anderson’s questions about the call and John’s potential involvement in an elaborate fake suicide plot dried up instantly. There was no way that John was a good enough actor to have kept this up for a year. He really seemed to believe that Sherlock was dead.

“I’m really sorry,” Anderson said as comfortingly as he could. “But I think there’s a chance he’s still alive.”

John bit his lip and looked up at the ceiling. “We’re done. Get out,” he whispered. “Go.”

Anderson didn’t need to be told twice. He grabbed his jacket and left the exam room with John still staring at the ceiling and breathing deeply.

On his way out of the surgery, he passed Mary, the pretty nurse, who looked at him suspiciously.

“Is there anything else I can get for you?” She asked him politely, her suspicion vanishing so quickly that Anderson felt he must have imagined it.

“No. Thanks.” Anderson said and rushed for the doors.

Mary, frowning, hurried down the hall and knocked loudly on the door of the exam room. “Doctor Watson?” she called out, concerned. “John? Is everything okay?”

“Yeah,” his called back through the door, his voice pitched higher than it normally was. “Just give me a minute.”

Maybe she’d just imagined it, but his voice had seemed to break on the final word. Forty eight seconds precisely passed before John opened the door, looking just as he did every other day.

He gave Mary a small, encouraging smile before asking: “Next patient?”

“Persistent cough, no fever,” she said, examining his face for signs of anything that might be wrong.

“Sounds like another virus,” he said with forced joviality. Reluctantly acknowledging her unstated concern, he sighed and added more seriously, “Mary, don’t worry about it. Everything is fine.”

She nodded, not believing a word, and he turned to go and treat his next patient.


	5. Book 5: Sherlock – The Monastery and the Abbot

Zeus sat at the far end of his nearly empty hall on Mt. Olympus. The door opened decisively and Zeus, expecting it, called out in greeting, “Athena…and Aphrodite? To what do I owe this...pleasure?”

“I’ve brought her with me to help make my point,” Athena said, striding across the hall with Aphrodite following gently in her wake.

Zeus frowned and looked at Hera, seated at his side, who shrugged her shoulders.

“And which point are you making?” Zeus enquired suspiciously.

“You should know. You summoned me.”

Zeus sighed deeply. “Athena,” he said. “We need to talk about your meddling in human affairs. I don’t see how that relates to Aphrodite because, as far as I’m aware, she is not involved and does not deserve the reprimand that I am about to give you.”

“Yes,” Athena countered, maddeningly calm. “That’s precisely why she’s here.”

“You are speaking nonsense again. Though, it’s nice to see you two getting along again,” Zeus said, glancing warily at Hera who was smiling serenely.

“Oh, we’re all quite firm friends,” Hera added. “What’s in the past is in the past. _We_ have the ability to move on.”

Zeus pursed his lips, aware of the insult, but unable to find a decent comeback.

“To get _back_ to the business at hand,” Zeus rumbled authoritatively, turning to face the two goddesses before him. “Athena, you have been meddling in the affairs of Sherlock Holmes after I specifically ordered you – and every other god – to stand well back. What do you have to say in your defense?”

“I haven’t interfered,” Athena said with a shrug.

“Then how, my child, would you care to explain your visit to Earth and the subsequent visits of one Mr. Philip Anderson to Molly Hooper and John Watson?” Zeus raised a bushy eyebrow expectantly.

“I didn’t tell him to see Dr Watson,” Athena answered truthfully.

“Athena,” Zeus said severely, “Your little logic games will not get you out of anything today. I do not care about your semantics. I care about the fact that you have _directly_ disobeyed my order to not meddle with the affairs between Sherlock Holmes and Poseidon.”

“Did you even see what I did?” Athena asked, nonplussed.

Lightening began to crackle in Zeus’ hand as his anger increased. “You talked to Philip Anderson. You suggested where Sherlock might be. You told him _how_ to talk to Molly Hooper. I don’t need to know anything else.”

Athena’s eyes flashed in anger. “Yes you do and that is why Aphrodite is here.”

Athena motioned Aphrodite forward and Zeus frowned in incomprehension and annoyance. Hera, on the other hand, looked intrigued.

“Sherlock Holmes has been away from England for a year,” Aphrodite began in her melodious voice.

“ _Your_ idea,” Zeus interjected, glaring at Athena, who rolled her eyes.

“And still John Watson grieves.”

“Yes!” Zeus said shortly. “Humans are mortal and their mortality causes them to do strange and inexplicable things.”

“Oh!” Hera interrupted. “Like you haven’t built strange memorials to mortal girls you’ve slept with.”

“That’s _different_ ,” Zeus protested furiously, rounding on his wife.

“It’s really not,” Aphrodite continued calmly as Athena tried to choke down her laughter.   

Zeus opened his mouth to argue, but Hera spoke over him. “Callisto,” she said smugly. “Let’s talk about Callisto and the stars.”

“That, as you _well_ remember, was to protect her from _you_ ,” Zeus snarled.

“Yes,” Hera said with the air of victory. “And won’t you do the most ridiculous things for love?”

Zeus glared, unable to argue the point. 

Aphrodite, ignoring the spat, spoke on: “Athena did only what was right: attempting to restore some hope to a man forced to falsely grieve the loss of his love.”

“Well, if that was your goal, you’ve gone about it in a pretty roundabout way,” Zeus said sulkily, slouching back into his chair and spinning a small bolt of lightning between his fingers.

“That,” Athena said indignantly, “Is because of your absolutely ridiculous and spotty rules about meddling. I’m not allowed to free Sherlock or to comfort John Watson and yet you let Ares and half of the other gods spend a hundred and fifty years meddling in Afghanistan! How is that right? There is no justice here.”

Zeus looked to Hera, who raised her eyebrows expectantly.

“Mortal life is not designed to be-“ Zeus began

“You meddle all the time! Why can’t you intervene – or let me do it! – to do the right thing and let John Watson and Sherlock Holmes be reunited?”

“She is right, you know,” Aphrodite added with a smile. “These men who you favor have spent a year in unendurable agony.”

“It is not my place to determine which mortals are saved from their agony and which are not. It is not our job to run about, removing everyone’s pain and the both of you would do well to remember that.”

“You do it all the time!” Athena cried furiously.

Zeus scowled, unable to refute the accusation.

“You pick and choose who to interfere with all the time. I’m not asking for miracles; I’m asking for Sherlock to have a sporting chance. Free him from the monastery and let him start working his way back home. He is in limbo – Poseidon is ignoring him – and he is a man you have long favored. It is absurd that you should let him stagnate.”

“You must admit,” Hera added reasonably. “That it hardly seems fair for Sherlock to be locked up. If Poseidon truly wants to exercise his wrath, why not let it happen on the open ground? Immobilization while refusing to engage seems quite contrary to Poseidon’s entire purpose.”

Zeus frowned and stroked his beard solemnly with the hand not spinning lightning bolts.

“Very well,” he finally sighed. “I will grant Sherlock his freedom to leave the monastery but that is all. As a condition to this intervention, none of you will in _any_ way interfere with Poseidon’s actions, no matter what they may be.”

Hera and Aphrodite both smiled winningly and Athena nodded. “I will not interfere with Poseidon,” she agreed.

“Let it be done,” Zeus commanded. “Feel free to tell Sherlock the news because I know that you would even if I had forbidden it. Now, get out of my hall.”

When Aphrodite and Athena had both left – Athena grinning triumphantly – Zeus turned to Hera and said accusingly, “I don’t appreciate the three of you ganging up on me.”

“Oh, it wasn’t planned,” Hera said with wide and innocent eyes. “I just happened to be here and I thought they were right.”

“Hmmph,” Zeus snorted. “You are a rotten liar.”

“But you love me anyways,” Hera smirked.

\--

Sherlock Holmes sat very still in the corner of a stone-walled room, empty save for a thin mat and warm robe, and wept.

Today was day 210 in a Tibetan monastery where the other monks had been respectful of the instructions (from Poseidon, he could only assume) that he had taken a vow of silence and was to be left alone for reflection and meditation. The monastery was small and built precariously on the side of a cliff, with no way up to the top and a series of baskets on pulleys the only way down.

Somewhere around day 73 of silence and respectfully avoided eye contact, Sherlock had examined the cliff face and rope and pulley system to see if he could fashion a means of escape. The drop, though, was sheer and without the promise of an inflatable bag at the bottom. Further, at least four strong monks were required to raise or lower a basket: Sherlock was trapped until the monastery decided to release him.

It was, perhaps, the politest form of torture he’d ever encountered.

Everyone considerately made sure he was adequately fed and clothed to endure a Himalayan winter, but no one would speak with him and no one would spend time with him. The forced isolation of the monastery meant that few monks lived there and that visitors were largely non-existent. Sherlock had deduced everything there was to possibly know about the twenty nine monks who lived in the monastery within the first fifteen days (it only took so long because several monks were also – voluntarily, though – in isolation for meditation). The boredom had set in then and, with a lack of anything else to occupy his mind, Sherlock had decided that he may as well try meditation and reflection to engage his mind with _something_.

That had been the wrong decision.

All he could think of was John.

His brain, so orderly and quick, collapsed into the groove of a scratched record: _John, John, John, John, John._

He had wept then, on day 78, for the first time in his active memory. They were selfish tears; he cried in frustration of being apart from John. He was supposed to have been back in Baker Street by then and it felt so desperately unfair that a perfect plan had been designed and executed only to anger a god.

As the days passed – he was keeping track of passing time by scratching a line onto the stone wall with a chip of the same stone every time the sun rose – he stopped weeping for himself and started weeping for John instead. These tears were different – they were the desperate anguish of the fear that he would never see John again. They were the guilt for leaving him in the first place. And they were the deep sorrow for the pain that he knew (hoped?) John was in.  

The tears tended to come, slow and heavy, when he scratched the day’s mark on the wall: another day without John. They came sporadically, hot and stinging, for the rest of the day whenever a memory would float though his rapidly decaying mind.

Thoughts of wasting away for eternity were ever present. The gods had been silent. His mind palace was falling into disrepair, room by room covered in cobwebs and dust cloths as they became unnecessary and irrelevant. By day 210, the only room still maintained, as though by a 24-hour vigil, was the room with memories of John and their time together at Baker Street. Sherlock spent every day curled up on the worn carpet in that room, painstakingly going through every single memory it contained.

It was thus deeply shocking when his vigil was interrupted by a banging on the door. It took Sherlock an embarrassingly long few seconds to realize that the banging was not on the physical door to his room (the monks were far too polite to bang, anyway) but on the door to John’s room in his mind palace.

Slowly and warily Sherlock got up and pulled open the door, sticky from disuse.

“Athena,” he breathed, not daring to believe she was really there.

“Sherlock,” she said with a triumphant gleam in her eye. “You’re free.”

Sherlock blinked; the words hardly registered.

“Zeus has agreed to instruct the abbot to let you down. You’re free!”

Athena frowned and reached out to shake him. “Sherlock!” she shouted, alarmed. “Wake up!”

“I am awake,” Sherlock protested, uncomprehendingly. “We’re talking.”

“You idiot,” Athena swore. “We’re in your head. You’re nearly catatonic!”

“Am I?” Sherlock asked, confused. He seemed to be awake.

Athena slapped him hard across the face.

“What was that for?” Sherlock demanded, stumbling backwards from the force of her hand.

“I am trying to get you awake. Work with me, here, Sherlock.” She sounded exasperated and yet concerned.

She slapped him hard across the face again and Sherlock was dimly aware of movement in another room of his mind palace: his nerves firing. Pain. Athena slapped him again and suddenly his face felt like it was on fire. He opened his eyes – when had he closed them? – and, of course, saw no one else in the small stone room with him.

“Athena?” he said aloud, not wanting to fall back into a stupor by re-entering his suddenly dangerous mind palace. 

“Finally,” her voice said in his ear.

Sherlock slowly stretched his legs, massaging the thigh muscles to restore circulation.

“Did anything I sad earlier register?” Athena asked.

“It’s a bit hazy,” Sherlock acknowledged.

“For the third time, then: you’re free to go. Zeus has told the abbot to let you down.”

Sherlock felt his breath turn suddenly thick, choking off his oxygen supply.

“I…I can go?”

“Yes!”

“Poseidon…”

“Oh,” Athena said off-handedly, “he didn’t agree to it. He’s still furious.”

It didn’t matter. Sherlock didn’t care. He scrubbed his face with his hands, feeling the tears – happy tears – spring to his eyes.

“Oh, thank you, Athena,” he whispered.

His legs felt shaky from their prolonged stillness, but Sherlock walked as quickly as he physically could to the abbot’s study.

The door was open and the abbot, a compact, middle-aged man with broad shoulders, thick glasses and a kind face, met his eyes.

“Sherlock,” he said congenially in greeting.

“Let me down. Immediately,” Sherlock demanded.

“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” the abbot said apologetically. 

“Zeus has commanded you!” Sherlock shouted, his voice cracking from long disuse.

“Your death would be on my conscience if I let you down now without proper food and gear,” the abbot explained calmly. “It shouldn’t take more than a few hours to get the supplies together. It is my honor to prepare you for your journey to Dharamsala.”

Sherlock felt as though the hours would be the longest hours of his life: the promise of freedom was so tantalizingly close.

“If you wish,” the abbot said kindly, noticing Sherlock’s distress and the fact that he had collapsed into the door's frame, “You may accompany me to the storeroom to watch the supplies be prepared.”

Watching progress would be infinitely better than sitting still: Sherlock nodded.

“Follow me, then,” the abbot said with a smile, gathering his robes neatly about his person and leaving the office.

As they crossed the grounds of the monastery - the abbot moving slowly to allow Sherlock's weakened legs to keep pace - Sherlock asked a question that had troubled him since his arrival. “You don’t believe in them – why are you taking orders from the gods?”

The abbot laughed merrily. “You don’t have to believe in everyone you work for, do you? I just freelance.”

“Freelance,” Sherlock repeated.

“We are a very isolated and vulnerable community,” the abbot explained simply. “If Poseidon asks me to house a man in a spare room in exchange for not blowing my supplies from their baskets until we starve, I am happy to oblige.”

“You’re paying them off,” Sherlock accused.

“That’s a very cynical way to think of it,” the abbot replied serenely. “They know not to ask me to do things I would refuse. I do favors in exchange for favors.”

Sherlock was eloquently and skeptically silent and so the abbot continued: “Take this, for example. Zeus gave me no orders to provide for you when you leave us. But I will not send a man to his death simply to follow orders even if it means you cannot leave immediately. Some gods may be angry with you, yes, but you should have a sporting chance to at least survive the Himalayas. The gods are capricious and I listen selectively and add my own interpretations when I deem it necessary.”

Sherlock shook his head in utter disbelief at the abbot and they walked in silence to the storeroom. 

The abbot, though, was good to his word and two hours later Sherlock sat in a sturdy basket at the edge of the cliff face along with several packs of various foodstuffs and shelter. Four strong, younger monks stood next to the abbot, preparing to send Sherlock off. One of them frowned and whispered something in the abbot’s ear.

“What are you saying?” Sherlock demanded, annoyed at the further delay.

“He is simply worried about the weather,” the abbot said apologetically. “Perhaps you’ve noticed: the wind has picked up substantially in the last half hour. It might be safer for you to remain here until it dies down.”

“No,” Sherlock said definitively. “I’m going now.”

The abbot smiled in an uncharacteristic it’s-your-funeral sort of way, perhaps knowing that nothing he said would convince Sherlock not to leave. “Then, I hope your journey is peaceful.”

 _Unlikely_ , Sherlock thought, as the basket finally began to lurch methodically down the side of the cliff.

It was thirty minutes before Sherlock’s basket reached the ground. He crawled out and shouldered his packs. Much as Sherlock hated to admit it, the young monk had been correct: the wind was bitingly cold and snow flurries were whipping about, stinging the exposed skin on his face.

Sherlock, though, felt none of this. The euphoria of freedom compelled him to begin walking down the empty path towards Dharamsala. He was going to see John again. He was going home to England.

The snow flurries became thicker and Sherlock realized several hours later that he could no longer see the path: he could walk off the side of the mountain and not realize it until the moment he fell. He cursed his idiocy – he should have set up camp before the snow had begun to fall quite so thickly. The wind was howling in his ears and Sherlock realized suddenly that he was very, very tired.

His brain, still struggling to throw off the cobwebs of six months without functioning, shouted weakly that he should not sleep: he would die of exposure. Numbly, Sherlock erected the tent that the abbot had given him and huddled inside, attempting to stay awake and warm. It was futile: despite the screaming wind his eyes kept drifting closed only to snap open when he realized what had happened.

How ridiculous to die of exposure on his first moment of freedom, he though bitterly. Where was Athena now?

Athena, of course, could do nothing. Poseidon had discovered Zeus’ decision to release Sherlock from the monastery, had known immediately that it was Athena’s doing, and had furiously sent the West Wind in punishment for Sherlock’s escape.

“Sherlock,” a melodious voice that was most certainly not Athena’s said, muting the wind, “Go to sleep. I will protect you.”

 _Auditory hallucination_ , Sherlock thought automatically, holding his eyelids open with his trembling fingers in an effort to stay awake.

The voice giggled musically. “I’m certainly real, though perhaps not a goddess you have spent much time praying to before. Sleep, Sherlock. I will protect you.”

Distrustful, but unable to keep his eyes open any longer, Sherlock closed his eyes and gratefully slept.

Aphrodite, foolishly overlooked by Poseidon, smiled as she wrapped him in a magical cloak so that he would survive the night. 


	6. Book 6: The Refugee and the Wanderer

Sherlock jerked awake from what felt like a sharp stick jabbing his rib cage.

It took an embarrassing several seconds to realize that there actually was a stick poking through the flap of his tent. And it was actually jabbing him in the ribs.

Sherlock shifted out of its reach, noticing that his muscles felt stiff and leaden, and gathered his few reserves of strength to defend himself from whomever was wielding the stick. The effort of moving proved to be for naught, though, as the stick suddenly fell and he heard a very high pitched squeal. And then a soft _thump_.

Confused – could this be delirium in the process of freezing to death? – Sherlock cautiously crawled the few feet across the tent and pulled back the flap with his fingertips.

The first thing he saw was blinding whiteness. It was fortunate for his retinas that the sun had not yet emerged or there was a very real chance that he may have actually _been_ blinded. Instead, the world was simply devoid of color, shape, and definition. Everything was terrifyingly blank and empty. The sky was even a grey-white, obscuring where the horizon ought to have been. If Sherlock had not been confident that the ground was beneath his knees, it would be very easy to confuse the sky with the ground. Just like a drowning diver who swims to the ocean floor towards what he thinks is safety.

 _Snow had fallen, snow on snow_ , his mind provided idiotically and unhelpfully. Sherlock shook his head to clear it and could have sworn that he heard rattling – his mind palace protesting the disturbance to its recently acquired peace.

While the area to the right of the tent was this horrifyingly empty snowscape, the left had both color and life. The terrified eyes of a girl (about fourteen, Sherlock estimated, give or take a year due to being well bundled against the cold and snow) looked back at him from where she had fallen backwards into the snow after being startled by signs of life from the tent.

Sherlock had to swallow a few times before he had command of his voice.

“Yes?” he demanded as imperiously as kneeling in a tent in the middle of a snow bank allowed for.

“You’re…you’re _alive_ ,” she stammered. “I’m so sorry, sir. I thought that the tent was abandoned or lost and I was just checking if there were any supplies that I could salvage. I never thought that anyone could have survived the night in it.” The words tumbled out of her mouth in an apologetic and frightened stream.

She stopped to draw breath in a deep gulp before rushing on. “I didn’t mean to bother you. I just-“ She gasped suddenly and Sherlock reflexively glanced over his shoulder to see what must have startled her.

“You’re a monk,” she whispered in awe.

“Sorry?” Sherlock asked.  

“Your robe!” She exclaimed. “Oh, how could I have done this to you of everyone? Please accept my humblest apology a thousand times over.” Her eyes filled with tears – possibly from emotion, but equally possibly from the stinging wind that still blew over the mountain, causing menacing wisps of snow to spiral up from the ground.

Sherlock looked down at himself – and, indeed, he was still wearing the heavy winter robes that the abbot and given him. There also seemed to be a blanket on his lap that he did not remember possessing the night before. He eyed that curiously, wondering which goddess might have sent it. Surely it hadn’t been a god.

The girl still looked distraught at having poked a sleeping monk with a stick and Sherlock decided to let her build him a story. If she thought him a monk, then a monk he would be. It was easier to accept the story that made sense to her than to try to explain why he was wearing a monk’s robes and camping quite recklessly on the pass towards Dharmasala. The most believable lies, after all, were the ones invented by those who need to believe in them.

Also, as much as Sherlock hated to acknowledge it, his mind was not fully functioning. The process of clearing the mental cobwebs from so long in isolation was not a quick one and nearly freezing to death had certainly not sped up the process. Pieces were starting to come back, but only in small shards and fragments. Far easier, thus, to play along with whatever story this girl concocted for his presence then to hope that a relevant and useful fragment might appear when he needed it.

Sherlock smiled gently at the girl.

“My child, there is no need to apologize. You have not disturbed me in the slightest.” A more blatant lie had probably never existed, he thought sourly.

She daubed her eyes on her sleeve and nodded, looking immensely relieved.

“Are you alone?” she asked, though did not wait for his response. “Oh, you must come and join my brother and me.”

“I would not wish to put you in that danger,” Sherlock replied truthfully, wondering uneasily about what Poseidon might have in store for him next.

Her eyes widened. “Are you taking a message to the Dalai Lama?”

The girl interpreted Sherlock’s lack of response as an answer in the affirmative. “You’ll be safe with us, I promise. My sisters work in the schools there. My brother and I will make sure you arrive safely. Oh, do let us look after you. My brother knows the border crossing well.”

Sherlock blinked. This lie had gotten very elaborate, very quickly. There was no way to back out of it without completely giving himself away.

“I would be happy to accept your very kind offer.”

The girl clapped her hands together in pleasure. “Can you walk? I do not mean to hurry you, but Jamyang will be very anxious if I do not return soon.”

Sherlock’s legs shook violently as he tried to stand – from weakness or from the cold, he could not tell. Somehow, though, they supported him. His hands were heavy and clumsy as he tried to pack his tent back into his pack and the girl took pity on him and tied everything together neatly and quickly.

“Follow me,” she said, sounding concerned, beckoning him with her gloved hand. “I’m sure Jamyang will give you some butter tea.”

Sherlock thought it was a curious property of physics that snow, which was so light and aerated, could be so heavy. Every step was like dragging his leg out of a puddle of wet cement. Possibly quicksand. He’d never experienced either, but could imagine that the odd feeling of being sucked into and then trapped in a curiously squishy ground was well replicated with the snow.

Sherlock noticed that the girl was watching his progress closely over her shoulder, clearly concerned that he might fall over at any minute. To assuage her concerns that he was near death and to help boost his own denial, he started talking.

“What’s your name?”

“Tenzin,” she answered promptly. “After the Dalai Lama himself.”

Sherlock nodded; it was a popular name. Three of the younger monks had been named Tenzin.

“And why are you going to Dharmasala?” He felt like an idiot for asking such basic and trivial questions that he should have been able to deduce, but the patter of ridiculous words seemed to bring relief to Tenzin and, if nothing else, distracted him from the endless drifts of snow that he was agonizingly wading through.

“To join my older sisters. It was an auspicious week to start.”

“Mmm,” Sherlock grunted, the effort of taking the next step too much to allow for a more coherent response.

“Jamyang!” Tenzin suddenly shouted. “Come quick! It was a monk and he’s alive!”

Sherlock was dimly aware of a pair of strong hands grabbing his shoulders and wrestling him a few feet through the snow before positioning him on a rock that had been thoughtfully brushed clear. Sherlock’s side felt suddenly warm – he was gratified to see that it was from a small fire rather than the next step of freezing to death. Jamyang must have built a fire in the relative shelter of a small outcropping of rock.

A thin, warm bowl was placed gently into his hands.

“Here, drink this,” a soft male voice said. “It’ll help.”

For a split second, the words and the voice were John. How often had John made him tea and forced him to drink it? How often had Sherlock sarcastically responded that medically John ought to know better – that tea had no curative properties?

John, though, had never made him butter tea with yak’s butter. And John was most assuredly not here.

The warm calories slowly began to infuse Sherlock’s body and some of his perception began to return. Jamyang turned out to be a short, slight young man, probably in his early twenties, who was watching him closely.

“That was a very close call,” Jamyang said in soothing tones. “You very nearly didn’t survive.” He graciously refilled Sherlock’s bowl.

“Yes,” Sherlock said, remembering that he was supposed to be a monk. “I am very grateful for the compassion of you and your sister.”

Jamyang nodded, his eyes never leaving Sherlock.

“Forgive me,” he said suddenly. “But it seems so odd that a monk from these parts would not be better prepared for the weather.”

“I was taken by surprise.”

“It began very quickly,” Jamyang conceded politely, clearly still skeptical. “We, of course, would be honored if you traveled with us to Dharmasala.”

It would be a grave error as well as the opposite of what a monk in his position would do to refuse the offer.

“I would be very grateful,” Sherlock said, clenching his jaw to prevent his face from betraying his unwillingness in the face of Jamyang’s close scrutiny.

“We’ll start again as soon as the wind quiets a bit more,” Jamyang said. “You need to rebuild your strength.”

Sherlock had to bite his tongue from retorting that the wind would probably never die down so long as he was still alive. He nodded in agreement and took a sip of his butter tea instead.

Watching closely, Athena smiled in the relief. Sherlock was safe for now.


End file.
